Another year, another SLUSH

Another year, another SLUSH by Anna, Robin, and Stephan.

We were three people with very different perspectives. As an exchange student, Robin had never attended SLUSH. As apart of Arcada Entrepreneurship Society, Anna saw SLUSH for the third time. Stephan knew a lot about SLUSH and felt privileged to attend and not just because our teacher finds it beneficial, which he is completely right about.

For our class: Internationalisation of Small and Medium sized Businesses, we study all aspects of business. Getting a first hand look at the hundreds of start-ups at SLUSH is putting what we know and have learned to the test. Business at its core is knowing the business plan, financials, as well as the resilience and passion of the team that takes them there. SLUSH brought all that for two solid days.

SLUSH is known as Europe’s biggest start up conference. From starting off 10 years ago with 300 people getting together, to this explosive event it is truly remarkable. Investors, companies, students, potential employers, media, and volunteers counted for 15,000 total in Messukeskus. We were all on the bottom floor with the four stages in the four opposite corners with company booths and food stands spread in the middle and a recruiting and investors area off to one side. The layout and use of space was brilliantly done, the lighting and decorations of each stage was jaw dropping, and there was always something to see. And with supercell as the main party sponsor, SLUSH had three parties, a pre party, a party between both days, and a mega after party as well. And I forgot the separate party for the volunteers. It really goes to show that entrepreneurs work hard but they play harder.

Serious themes such as the current refugee crisis in Europe, green technology and the future of health technology were just some of the issues that speakers tackled at the 4 stages. With speeches ongoing throughout both days it was very hard to pick which speeches, fire-side chats and discussions to attend and for which there was just not enough time.

For next year SLUSH announced that they are making SLUSH bigger. The hosting of SLUSH will take more days because there is just so much to see and two days is not nearly enough to cover it all.

Inside their doors, opportunities are endless and you feel like a rock star. The energy and positive attitude is contagious. And whats even better is although most of these start ups are very different, they preach the same ideas of staying passionate and loving your work and loving your customers and making a difference. It really is spectacular and can’t possibly be summarised in one blog post but we are not shy about sharing.

The course “Internationalisation of Small and Medium sized Businesses (5 ECTS)” is the first course of the “Business in the Baltic Sea Region (15 ECTS)” extensions studies.  During the course students plan and manage small internationalization projects and actively support SMEs to enter foreign markets. This is done in co-operation with the Digas project, supported by the European ERASMUS+, KA2 programme.